In his first visit to the US as Italy’s President, Sergio Mattarella met with President Barack Obama, made an important appearance at the United Nations, visited the 9/11 memorial, the new Whitney Museum designed by Renzo Piano, the Columbia University, the City Hall of NYC and the Museum of Immigration in Ellis Island. And, above all, he embraced the Italian and Italian-American community at the Guggenheim Museum. “I am also a New Yorker” the Italian President told them in English, flanked by NYS Governor Andrew Cuomo, Italian Ambassador Claudio Bisogniero, and the Consul General in New York Natalia Quintavalle: “New York is the anthology of the world, and Italians have made and continue to make a significant contribution to the America’s progress”. Recap of his visit

Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi travelled to D.C. to seek the White House’s endorsement for his ambitious economic program. According to a White House statement, the two state leaders will meet on Friday to tackle other topics including the stabilization of Libya, U.S.-EU unity on Ukraine, and the need to counter extremist groups throughout the Middle East.

In order for Italian Americans to tackle head-on the discourse of race and ethnicity we should abandon the implicitly exclusionary term “tolerance,” which implies something distasteful, if not outright negative. We should embrace instead the more inclusive term “acceptance,” which underscores assent of a condition or situation—in this case, someone’s difference (e.g., race, gender, ethnicity, sexuality)—without attempting to disapprove or modify it.